Microsoft Shares MS-DOS Source Code for First Time Ever

Early tech fans might remember the good 'ol days of Microsoft MS-DOS, the company's first operating system from the 1980s. Now, with the help of the Computer History Museum, Microsoft is making the source code for DOS available to the public for the first time ever. Get excited, hackers.

The Computer History Museum, based in Mountain View, Calif., is making MS DOS 1.1, 2.0 and Word 1.1a available to help fans and technologists better understand the history of computing.

In 1980, IBM approached Microsoft to work on a project code-named “Chess.” What followed was a significant milestone in the history of the personal computer. Microsoft, at the time, provided the BASIC language interpreter for IBM. However, they had other plans and asked Microsoft to create an operating system. Without their own on hand, Microsoft licensed an operating system from Seattle Computer Products which would become the foundation for PC-DOS and MS-DOS.

IBM and Microsoft developed a unique relationship that paved the way for advancements in the nascent personal computer industry, and subsequent advancements in personal computing.

Following the first DOS-based version of Microsoft Word in 1983, Word for Windows launched in 1989 and become a huge hit for the company. It generated over half the revenue of the worldwide word-processing market, according to Microsoft.

"Thanks to the Computer History Museum, these important pieces of source code will be preserved and made available to the community for historical and technical scholarship," a company said in a statement.

It's enough to make us want to find our old 5.25-inch floppy drives and green CRT monitors.

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